Two Worlds, Starting with Kaguya of Penglai Mountain

In memories filtered through a grey lens

Before being taken away by the celestial beings, the princess secretly warned the protagonist not to reveal his abilities to the Lunarians.

The flashback ends, and the scene shifts to reality.

The fallen samurai was emitting a shimmering light, indicating that he possessed this item.

Yukari Yakumo controls her character to approach the light source and presses the confirmation button as prompted.

The protagonist begins to rummage through the corpse of the dead samurai.

Soon, he held a small jade pendant in his hand.

[This looks like a key to the moon; I can use it to enter the moon and save Kaguya.]

Such thoughts popped into the protagonist's head.

Then an option appeared in the game.

[Should we go to the moon immediately?]

【Yes or no】

Yakumo Yukari: “…”

Yukari Yakumo: "If I may ask, it seems the game character is going to enter the Lunar Capital. What I'm going to do there next is kill the residents of the Lunar Capital, right?"

Kaguya Houraisan: "That's right. So, Meryl, are you scared?"

With a bright smile on her face, the princess provoked the blonde girl.

Yukari Yakumo: "I'm not afraid, but I'm curious about Your Highness's condition."

You, a true princess of the moon, created a game where you run up to the moon capital and go on a killing spree. Is that really okay?

She looked at Kaguya Houraisan with a strange expression, the meaning in her eyes was all too clear.

Kaguya Houraisan: "So, Merry, are you going to enter the Lunar Capital immediately?"

The princess remained unmoved and changed the subject.

Yukari Yakumo: "I plan to wait."

Her unique perspective allows her to see things that ordinary people cannot.

What Yakumo Yukari saw was not the game code itself, but the result of the code flow, a working whole.

If you compare a game to a person, what she sees is that person's movements, not the twitching of their muscles or the flow of their blood.

That's why she felt it was beautiful when she first saw it.

From this perspective, Yukari Yakumo clearly saw that in the "actions" of the code flowing before her eyes, there were other things that indicated the option to choose "no".

Therefore, she refused to go to the moon immediately without any hesitation.

She manipulates the character to move forward on the current map.

Sure enough, they soon discovered a glowing treasure guarded by a lion in the corner of the map.

This is what the village elders call a mutated giant insect. Unless I have enough skills, I'd better not mess with it.

The characters on the screen had these words appearing above their heads.

Yukari Yakumo glanced at the blue bar in the upper right corner of the screen, which represented the duration of the "Time Slowdown" effect; it was now half full.

"You could try not using 'Time Slowdown'."

Realizing the value of the blue bar, the blonde girl immediately made a decision.

She has discovered that the "time slowdown" in the game only slows down the speed of time.

If you react quickly enough and press the button in time when the enemy rushes in, you can accomplish everything without using "time slowdown" by relying on your own reaction.

She controlled her character to walk towards the lion, and the lion was the first to spot her in the game.

The lion roared and charged at the player in an instant.

It was incredibly fast, much faster than the samurai we had just seen, and its claw strikes created wind blades that obscured the entire screen.

The game character controlled by Yukari Yakumo was cleaved in two by a wind blade in the blink of an eye.

Yakumo Yukari: “…”

The blonde girl turned to look at the two people beside her.

The current predicament seems completely unsolvable.

The game world is not reality. In a side-scrolling platformer, if it's covered up like this, there's really nowhere to hide.

Kazuya Kurokawa: "If you swing your sword the instant the wind blade strikes, you can deflect it."

Yukari Yakumo: "I've never heard of cutting through a wind blade with a knife."

In the real world, wind blades are completely invisible, and unless one possesses a specific understanding of the concept, it is impossible to cut them down.

Trying to cut water with a knife only makes it flow more; using a knife to counteract the wind's edge is completely unrealistic.

Kazuya Kurokawa: "But this is a game, isn't it?"

He shrugged at the girl in front of him: "Miss Meryl, would you like to continue?"

Yukari Yakumo: "Can I continue?"

Kazuya Kurokawa: "Press any key to return to the last save point."

Kaguya Houraisan: "I remember you, Meryl. You should be able to see a different perspective that we can't see, right? Didn't you see this aspect of things?"

The beautiful princess then asked a meaningful question.

Yukari Yakumo: "Even realistic people can't perfectly capture every little action of others; there will always be things they miss."

The blonde girl spoke while casually clicking the controller.

A clear, murmuring girl's voice came from the screen.

"Little White~ Little White~ Wake up~ Wake up~"

"I'm sorry, but you need to try a little harder. Please try a little harder."

"Please come find me quickly."

Yukari Yakumo immediately recognized the voice as that of Kaguya Houraisan, who was standing behind her.

The emotions are sincere and the language is earnest, as if they come from a distant place, as if it is truly calling out to something.

As the sound ended, the loading black screen also finished, and the character on the screen returned to the location where he had just defeated the Moon Messenger, with the opponent's body, which had been split in two, still lying at his feet.

Yukari Yakumo: "Is there any deeper meaning behind the protagonist being called Shiro?"

Kaguya Houraisan: "Oh, I originally wanted to name him Kuro, but Kurokawa refused."

The real-life Moon Princess shook her head and sighed.

Kaguya Houraisan: "Alright, enough nonsense. After you take down this lion, I remember there's a secret manual that lets you double jump. Grab it quickly and get to the moon. I can't wait to see you go on a killing spree."

Yakumo Yukari: “…”

No matter how many times I hear this kind of statement, I feel there's something wrong with it.

Yukari Yakumo: "I think I need to reconsider whether to continue our cooperation."

Kaguya Houraisan: "Don't worry, the ground is an extremely filthy place for the Lunarians. They would probably have trouble breathing if they stayed there for too long. They won't come down unless absolutely necessary."

The princess confidently described the moon's condition.

No one knows the moon better than her.

Kaguya Houraisan: "Merry, as a scholar, don't you want to see the moon? As one of the people in charge of this game, I've actually described the moon's condition in detail here~"

The princess in the moon cast a spell.

Yukari Yakumo: "You're really serious."

Although she said that, the blonde girl didn't stop what she was doing.

She was not unfamiliar with the scenery of the moon; she could blur the boundaries of things, and she could even turn the moon's reflection in the water into a real doorway to the moon.

However, out of fear of Tsukiyo, she had never actually entered the Moon Capital, which was shrouded in a massive barrier on the moon.

To be honest, I was a little curious.

Yukari Yakumo refocused her attention on the screen.

She didn't see Kaguya Houraisan behind her with a wicked grin on her face, while Kazuya Kurokawa looked at the princess with a helpless expression.

Chapter Sixty: The Legend of Kaguya

The screen's light illuminated the blonde girl's beautiful face.

In another world, separated by a screen, a sword-wielding samurai is being manipulated by Yukari Yakumo to carry out a massacre.

Once you enter the Moonlit Realm, the task of the character you control is simple and straightforward: in each level, use the surrounding environment and your skills to kill everyone on the map as quickly as possible.

Through various killing techniques, new skills were unlocked, and more killing techniques were acquired, enabling faster and better killing of stronger individuals.

How many people have been killed already?

Do you remember how many pieces of bread you've eaten?

At first, Yukari Yakumo thought these words were just some stupid youkai bragging.

How could a monster born from human beliefs possibly be the type that kills endlessly without feeling anything?

But today—

Yukari Yakumo herself did have that thought.

She genuinely doesn't remember how many people she's killed.

Kazuya Kurokawa: "Because these things are fake, they will carefully remember how many NPCs they have killed. It's strange that you are the one who is Meli."

Kurokawa Kazuya, being human, instead comforted Yakumo Yukari in the midst of the killing and even offered his own commentary.

The demons in the realm couldn't help but find this somewhat amusing.

Yukari Yakumo: "I was just thinking about it, you don't need to worry about such a small thing, but I do have a question I want to ask."

She once again controlled the character, completing the secret manual she had found in the corner in the previous level, and then unlocked the new skill "Whirlwind Slash".

This skill grants the samurai character the ability to attack enemies behind them.

It's just that simple to obtain.

Even if this skill were real, it would be insignificant to Yukari Yakumo, let alone if it were fake, but—

Yukari Yakumo: "Why am I happy when I gain feelings?"

The wise and insightful demon posed this question with a philosophical flair.

Kazuya Kurokawa: "Probably because you are not yourself in the outside world but a character in the game, every gain I make for the character in the game makes me happy, even if it is completely useless to you."

Yukari Yakumo: "That makes sense. It's like deceiving your senses, telling you that you've obtained something, but you haven't actually obtained it in reality. However, the pleasure of obtaining it still lingers in your heart, attracting you to keep starting this meaningless work."

Although the blonde girl was saying things that were meaningless, her mind became increasingly focused.

"This is practically a monster trap."

She looked at the screen in front of her and made this conclusion.

What kind of being would knowingly repeat meaningless actions because of the pleasure it brings to their mind?

Children and animals who obey their instincts and pursue only their own pleasure, and monsters who are the same as them.

Monsters are creatures that obey their instincts, and at the same time, they are the ones who cannot tolerate delayed gratification.

Therefore, it is extremely difficult to get any monster to resist its instincts and learn related matters.

Those who possess this awareness within the monster community are basically all considered great monsters as long as they don't die.

But what if we let them learn through this game method that uses various numerical structures to perfectly adjust and provide timely feedback?

Yukari Yakumo doesn't even need to pay a real price in reality; she can make the youkai obedient simply by using in-game rewards.

She didn't expect the monsters to learn quickly; given their average lifespan, once they started learning, there was nothing they couldn't learn.

Will she find more like-minded individuals among the monsters by then?